


A Technarch Family Album

by GoldenThreads



Category: New Mutants, X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Family Bonding, Family Fluff, Gen, Illustrated, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-13
Updated: 2014-09-12
Packaged: 2018-02-13 00:44:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2130645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenThreads/pseuds/GoldenThreads
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Warlock introduces his beloved son to the team, and Doug tries his hand at befriending another baby Technarch. </p>
<p>Snapshots from Tyro's brief stay with the New Mutants. (post-v3)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Naming of the Doug

 

After the sudden Technarch catastrophe, the rest of the cookout went off without a hitch.

Granted, a massive techno-organic alien child lumbering around stomping holes in the yard and shouting a constant stream of queries probably fell under the usual definition of hitch, but Doug was more than willing to redefine terms in the name of family.

“Newfriendoug!”

Which wasn’t to say his patience had no limit. Doug bit back a sigh and lowered his burger back to his plate, then flashed Tyro a practiced grin. “Yes?”

“Consumables pathetic and small!” Tyro boomed, glowering at the offending meal. No one had taught him the difference between speaking and shouting yet, a distinction that had been completely useless in the depths of space. Still, there was a hint of genuine concern as he asked, “Query: Insufficient?”

Doug shook his head. “We don’t need as much food as you, Tyro. I assure you it’s more than sufficient.”

Transfixed with disbelief, Tyro watched him finish off the burger then clomped off to investigate the rest of the cookout.

He returned barely five minutes later.

“Dougfriend!”

“Yes?”

“Query: Why does Earthplanet burn?” Tyro stretched his arm all the way across the yard to point at the lava-powered grill. He’d tried to stick his head in it earlier, thinking he could peek inside the planet that way. Warlock had beeped something about it being a door to the _goblins_ , and though Doug hadn’t the slightest idea what they were screeching on about, it certainly put a stop to Tyro’s lava spelunking career.

“Because Amara asked it to,” Doug explained simply. He had to remind himself that Tyro wasn’t really a small child, just completely ignorant of Earth and all its inhabitants. Compared to Warlock’s childhood determination that he already comprehended his humanfriends, Tyro’s natural eagerness to ask questions was actually a relief.

“Earthplanet obeys meat-thing commands!?”

Starting to feel dizzy, Doug shook his head yet again. “Nope, only Amara’s.”

Tyro whipped around and stared at her in awe. It wasn’t astonishing enough to boost her from mere meat-thing status, but it did earn her a certain level of deference. While he wasn’t impressed with the shooting star man or the lady with the flying hoofbeast, the sun-shifter and earth-melter possessed powers even he couldn’t match. He didn’t understand how it didn’t cook their meat. He’d have to keep an eye on them.

When Doug glanced back at the rest of the gang for aid, he found them snickering and grinning at his plight. Seeing him with another young Technarch trailing after him like a lost duckling — even a 5-ton duckling of mass destruction — had them drunk on nostalgia, and none of them would dare raise a hand to help, lest Tyro imprint on them as well.

Meanwhile, Tyro’s proud papa was tickled pink. Literally. With his circuits tinged a distinctive faint rose color, Warlock had been beaming at them both without a moment’s pause ever since their introduction, and if not for that joyous approval, Doug’s patience wouldn’t have lasted half as long.

“Selfriendoug!” Tyro wailed, returning yet again for wisdom. “Query: Why does yipyapthing abhor Self?”

Yipyapthing, otherwise known as Thori, glowered at them from under one of the picnic tables and flashed his teeth in warning. It was in poor taste for the Asgardians to bring him when Warlock was still heartbroken over having his secret yet beloved helpuppy taken away, but at least there hadn’t been any gnawed ankles.

“I told you not to try and pet him,” Doug reminded gently.

“But—”

“Maybe if you ask him for permission?”

Judging by the infuriated shrieks and snarls and threats of violence that soon filled the air, Doug had clearly forgotten the finer points of Technarch-wrangling. He groaned and scrambled over to break up the fight.

“Yipyapthing tried to **_burn_ ** Self! Self will destroy puny creature!”

“No, you most certainly will _not_ ,” Doug told him firmly, grabbing him by the arm as though it would do any good.

Luckily, that simple touch was enough to make Tyro’s mighty shoulders plummet. “Selfmentordoug objects to—”

“Tyro, mind if I make a query of my own?” A certain issue of diction had been bothering Doug for a while now, though with only Warlock as a model, it was difficult for him to form a universal impression of Technarch linguistics. Still, it was…strange.

Tyro perked up immediately, eager to help. “What is query?”

“You’ve gone through a half dozen names for me by now. I don’t mind or anything, but I was wondering why. Are you having trouble settling on one for some reason?”

“Self has observed relationships of meat-things,” Tyro answered slowly. It was clearly a matter he’d given great thought, and his already serious voice carried even more weight than usual. “Conclusion: Nomenclature insufficient. Similar pattern unavailable. Self does not know word for selfsoulfriend of proxysiredam.”

“Oh, um.”

That was certainly a more complicated question than Doug had expected, though he was flattered that Tyro wanted a special name for him so soon. It had been months before Warlock finally eased into his pet names and stopped calling everyone by their full names for good. The brutal simplicity of the siredam-heir relationship didn’t leave room for many family words to begin with, but it wasn’t as though English offered an easy solution either. They had trouble enough trying to explain _selfsoulfriend_ to people.

“Let’s go ask Warlock, okay? He’s better at finding the perfect words.” Better at making things up, more like.

They found Warlock huddled with the team, listening avidly as Kitty regaled them with gossip from the school. The first to notice their approach, he perked up and hurried over to join them, but when Doug relayed the problem, Warlock froze up in bewilderment. He cocked his head and puzzled over it for a long moment, and silence fell upon their little family circle.

“Siredaddy!” came a sudden shout from the group behind them.

“ _Bobby_ ,” Shan hissed. She raised her drink to cover the tiny grin that had crept onto her lips.

“Come on guys, it’s like baby-daddy, it’s _hilarious_.”

“No, it makes Doug sound like Warlock’s dad. It won’t work at all,” said Amara.

Sam rubbed at his chin thoughtfully. “Dougfather?”

“What, like the Technarch mafia?” Dani laughed and waved her drink.

The team had always leapt to certain _conclusions_ about the selfsoulfriend deal, but their immediate assumption that Tyro was automatically Doug’s son as well had him frozen in horror. He wasn’t a _father_. He wasn’t a role model either — quite honestly, he was just a mess.

“Why is this your decision?” he asked loudly, hoping to shut them all up.

Kitty shot him a pleased look, and her eyes twinkled with laughter at his growing dismay. “Because we’re the proxyfamily, so we’re making a _proxy_ decision as a _family_.”

The logic was sound enough for Warlock, who shrugged and hovered around the outskirts of the circle to listen in on the ideas. Selfparentdoug got shot down for being far too boring, Fatherdoug for being too priestly. Nate offered _Dag_ as a combination of Doug and dad, and got banished to the timeout picnic table for his trouble. Selfpapa earned the closest thing to a unanimous vote, but was still missing a crucial something.

By the time Roberto started suggesting Proxydaddy for its similarity to _foxy daddy_ , Doug couldn’t stand it any more. He threw up his arms and stormed to the other end of the yard where he could sulk out of earshot. But that familiar thump-thump-thump followed after him, and moments later Tyro dropped down next to him, snapping his legs in against his chest in an awkward movement that reminded Doug a little too much of Transformers.

He hadn’t even known Warlock was a father until Tyro turned up a few hours ago, and now everyone was redrawing his family tree without his permission, and they kept looking at him like he was a five-year-old playing house, and Warlock looked so scared and expectant all at once and— Things were moving terribly fast. _I’m a little young for this_ , Doug thought miserably to himself. He would’ve said it aloud, but he didn’t want Tyro to take it the wrong way.

“Self does not understand. Self made simple query.” Tyro scratched at his head, doing his best to try out the human body language he spent the day observing.

Sympathetic and irritated all at once, Doug distracted himself by fiddling with a few odd blades of grass. The yard needed to be mowed again soon, which was always a good meal for Warlock, if as distressingly inadequate as everything else. He wondered if he could remember how to make those grass whistles from his childhood and set to work rummaging around through the longer clusters in search of the perfect piece. Too thin, too wide… After a few minutes he glanced over to find Tyro trying in vain to pluck a single blade of grass. His bulky fingerconstructs were much too cumbersome for anything more delicate than ripping whole clumps of earth away, but still he attempted gentleness.

Tyro startled at the sudden sharp, squealing cry of the whistle, and Doug grinned himself all the way out of his foul mood. He made a few more shrill sounds with his instrument, then twirled it thoughtfully between his fingers.

“You call Warlock by his name, right?” he asked.

“Affirmative.”

“Could you call me Doug, then? Not Dougperson or Friendoug or Mentordougsir, just plain old normal Doug?” It would’ve been awful nice to be plain old Doug again, if only to his…proxyson.

Tyro mulled it over, then gave a nod. “Understood. Plainoldnormaldoug.” He waited a few beats, just as his father had taught him, then slowly raised his eyebrows. “Request for confirmation: Self’s humor successful? Doug is cheered?”

Doug chuckled under his breath, and the light in his eyes shone with genuine warmth. “Yeah. Thanks, pal.” He raised the grass whistle back to his lips and winked. “Now match my pitch and we’ll give that yipyapthing a little payback.”


	2. The Cookie Monster

The party dragged on for hours, and by midnight it had fallen so far into drunken revelry that no one even noticed Doug attempting to sneak an elephant into the house. They cut behind the thunderous Asgardians and made it all the way to the door before running into difficulties.

“Query: Purpose of this structure?” Tyro boomed, trying to squeeze himself through the doorway with little success. “Shelter for creche terminal? Romantic background for matingrituals?”

“Shhhhh! Just get up to my room and I’ll explain anything you want!” Doug pushed against Tyro’s prickly backside with all his might. Cripes, the kid weighed even more than Warlock. “Shift, darn you! Shift!”

Suddenly remembering his form was malleable, Tyro sucked himself through the doorway like a conch into its shell. He slowly reformed on the other side with a boastful, victorious grin. Doug returned the grin for encouragement’s sake, but hurried Tyro on toward the stairs — if Dani caught them, there was sure to be a lecture in their future.

The stairs proved a challenge of their own. Doug had never considered Warlock a creature of great elegance, but compared to Tyro, who hulked along as if he didn’t know his own body, let alone his own strength, Warlock was a delicate masterpiece of form and functionality. He rarely even touched the stairs, zipping up with a lightning-quick stretch of his body from one spot to another. Tyro took the stairs one at a time, drawing himself up like a slowly encroaching mudslide as the sparse hairs on the top of his head bent and twitched like antennae.

Once they’d made it into Doug’s bedroom, Tyro stopped in the middle of the room, glanced around in vague interest, then stared at Doug expectantly. He had no idea why he was there.

“…Sorry,” Doug mumbled, rubbing sheepishly at the back of his neck. “It was probably more interesting for you outside.” All the bawdy noise outside had drained the last of Doug’s energy, but he hadn’t wanted to retire inside alone.

“Plainoldnormaldoug also interesting.” Tyro offered it as a simple fact, and didn’t even wait for Doug’s thankful grin before turning to investigate the room. “This nest?” he asked as he pulled all the sheets and blankets off if Doug’s bed, digging for who knew what. “For recharge?”

“Exactly.” It was a great relief that he wouldn’t have to explain the concept of sleep this time around — it took Warlock weeks to really get it.

Tyro nodded. “Self nested in Warlock.” Oblivious to Doug’s look of open-mouthed horror, he continued over to the bedside table and turned the light on and off until it had satisfied him.

He discovered a book lying there and picked it up with focused gentleness, holding it open above his head so he could use gravity to rifle through the pages instead of his bulky hands. Doug’s bookmark fell out and fluttered down to the ground, but Tyro managed to catch it on his foot. He fumbled for a moment as he replaced it on the proper page, then closed the book and held it up to the larger bookshelf on the opposite wall.

“That’s a book.”

“Tyroself knows books,” he scoffed, glowering in offense. He threw the book away and stomped over to the bookshelves, grabbing a half dozen at once and inspecting all their insides. “Books broken!”

Doug frowned. “…What?”

“Broken! Pictures gone!” Tyro sounded increasingly frantic, pacing along the bookshelf.

“Pictures..? Like comics? Hold on a sec.”

Roberto definitely had some comics stashed away in his room — Doug just hoped they’d be family-friendly ones. He dashed down the hall and returned a few minutes later with a handful of colorful comics. Doug held them up for Tyro to read since the pages were even more delicate than the hardcovers on his shelf.

“Pictures do not _move_ ,” Tyro shouted, voice crashing so loudly that Doug flinched and took a step back. “MEAT-THINGS BROKE BOOKS!”

“Books don’t have moving pictures!” Doug shouted back. _Please, Lord, don’t let me be crushed by a Technarch toddler over a literary dispute._ The irony would be too much to bear. “Not here, at least. Earth books are just different!”

Tyro fell silent and pondered this logic for a long moment. At last he gave a grumpy grunt, concluding that meat-thing culture was woefully underdeveloped. Poor meat-things. No wonder Warlock had to spend so much effort on shifting himself to fit their tiny minds.

He pointed to a beat up poster on the wall. “Query: What that?”

Those three words would become the catch phrase for the next two hours of Doug’s life as Tyro slowly made his way around the room and inquired after every item with unbridled curiosity. The poster was a pathetic fixed mirror, the laptop was a cerebral prosthesis to compensate for those pitiful meat-thing memory capabilities, and the window screens were apparently a form of cowardice, since any real hero would face visiting insect-attackers without a protective cover.

Finally Doug was yawning so much that Tyro couldn’t even keep his train of thought, so confused was he by the involuntary gape and sigh of his human friend’s restless mouth.

“Time for recharge,” Doug sighed, covering yet another yawn with his hand. He hadn’t felt this tuckered out in ages, but Tyro really sapped all the energy from a room. “Warlock usually plants himself in front of the TV, but you’re welcome to stay if you want, buddy.”

Accepting the invite, Tyro settled down next to the bed and let his extremities discorporate like thick tar. His head remained solid and bright-eyed, peeking up above the edge of the bed so he could still pay attention to Doug. To anyone else it would’ve been deeply unsettling, but Doug just shook his head and nestled into his sheets.

“Query: Ocular sensors require similar recharge?” came the noisy voice a few minutes later.

“All my sensors do,” Doug grumbled. He had a sneaking suspicion where this was leading.

“…Vocal apparatus requires similar recharge?” Tyro asked more mournfully this time.

Doug sighed and rolled over to face him. “Let me guess: Recharge just means you stop moving for a few hours.”

“Affirmative.”

Though Doug gave a frustrated groan, he had to admit it made more sense that way — Technarchs didn’t need sleep, but Warlock would’ve surely needed a break from watching Tyro now and then. Telling him they needed some peace to recharge was the logical solution, especially since you couldn’t exactly plop a Technarch in a playpen and expect it to stay put.

“My recharge is different,” Doug told him with all the patience he could muster at 3AM. “Humans stay perfectly still…perfectly quiet…and let all their muscles relax until they drift off to sleep…”

He could feel the change come over Tyro, part peaceful calm and part tense effort to remain that way. The floor boards stopped creaking as Tyro stayed perfectly still, and the hush of Doug’s third story room almost overpowered the enduring ruckus from outside. He smiled against his pillow, proud that Tyro could listen so well.

…Until Tyro let himself relax and crashed straight through the floor.

 

*

 

“More! More!” Tyro drummed his mighty fists on the kitchen table, shouting in time with the beeping kitchen timer and sending the dishes clattering so violently that Warlock snatched them up in a panic. After last night’s debacle, no one had any faith in his mass control. “More!”

Doug put on his oven mitts and went to take out the two trays of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. “Patience, Tyro,” he reminded, pausing for a moment to enjoy the alluring smell. It was the fourteenth batch of cookies he’d made so far that afternoon.

When Dani discovered the gaping hole in their house, she’d immediately gone into action mode and started giving orders. She sent Roberto and Nate to the hardware store for materials, put Amara on structural integrity duty, commanded Warlock into an all-in-one power tool, relegated Doug to punitive snack duty, and tried very hard to ignore her pounding hangover. As for Tyro, she left him transfixed in front of the television with a very age-appropriate program: Sesame Street.

“Cookies!” Tyro cawed in delight as Doug pushed the tray over to him. Without delay, he snatched up the first one.

“I said _patience!_ ”

Tyro froze, eyes gone wide, and slowly dropped the cookie. He laid his hands flat on the table and stared at Doug for a sign.

“…Go ahead.”

As Tyro started tossing the cookies into his mouth one after another, Warlock raised a hand to cover his own mouth and hide his smile. He shot Doug a mirthful look, eyebrows raised, and Doug gave him a knowing smirk in return. They both tried to hold back the very same joke about cookies and monsters and scruffy blue role models.

Batch number fifteen went in the oven soon after, and sixteen and seventeen after that. Tyro couldn’t smell them, let alone taste them, but the TV had managed to instill a great exuberance in him for the cookie experience. Parentbeings made them for their crechelings! To show affection! And Doug didn’t stop making them no matter how many Tyro gobbled up! The more cookies he gobbled down, the more joyful he became — and the more Warlock glowed with an affectionate warmth, too.

By the time the rest of the team finished their reconstruction effort and slumped into the kitchen for cookies of their own, Doug had forgotten who he was supposed to be cooking for.

“We’re…fresh out…” he offered sheepishly, glancing between his teammates and the empty boxes of supplies. No eggs, no milk, barely a tablespoon of sugar remaining. “Sorry?”

Roberto groaned in despair and sank down into a chair. “Snack duty was _sacred_ , Doug. _How could you do this?!_ ”

“Meat-thing requires sustenance?” Tyro asked, directing his question to all. “Tyroself can supply!” He reached into his own torso and victoriously pulled out a handful of still-warm cookies, completely undigested. Unaware of humans’ internal digestive methods, he’d simply collected all of them inside his belly like a living cookie jar.

With a leery glance at the cookies, Roberto inched his fingers towards the offered hand. Nate got there first, gobbling up a half dozen with just as much enthusiasm and gluttony as Tyro had earlier. He gave a garbled thank-you with his mouth full, cookies stuffing his chipmunk cheeks. Soon enough they were both sitting in a half-ring around Tyro, snatching up the baked goods as he pried them from his gut. Even Amara gave in and nibbled tentatively at one.

But instead of joining in or rolling her eyes at the spectacle, Dani gave Doug a funny look, one of those worried ones packed with meanings he couldn’t help but read. _This isn’t like you_ , it said, and only then did he realize how little he’d spent cooped up in his room the past two days, how odd he must look with an apron tied round his waist and flour on his shirt, and how utterly exhausted of smiling at Tyro he really was.

Dani tilted her head in Warlock’s direction, gaze still demanding an answer from Doug. _Are you trying to make it up to him?_ For all the past month’s misery, for godforsaken futures and an utter absence of warmth, and for almost…

Doug turned away, squared his shoulders, and started washing the dishes. It wasn’t about him; it wasn’t about Warlock either. He wasn’t playing house. He was just being a good host to Tyro for the few days he’d be there, that was all.

A moment later Warlock took up drying duty beside him, face lit up in a smile so tender it made Doug’s bones ache.


	3. A Day at the Beach

They kept Tyro locked up inside the house for as long as they could. He was easily distracted and eager to please, but they all knew if he really wanted to leave the house, there wouldn’t be any stopping him. It was Dani who proposed a solution: a day at the beach, if and only if Tyro could perfect a humanform first.

(Warlock had voted Disneyland, but Dani firmly refused — he was still banned after staging a red alert mission to trick them into a vacation day at the park. Never again.)

Tyro thought a meatform was beneath him. It didn’t matter how many personas Warlock modeled first, or how passionately Roberto argued for a buff Tom Selleck. They were degrading, and worse still, they were _wimpy_. Even when Warlock gave in and showed off a few broad-shouldered superheroes that would make for disastrous disguises, Tyro was far from appeased. He wouldn’t even try them on to prove he could.

And then one afternoon Amara snapped her fingers and went to fetch their DVD collection. She popped the disk into the player, skipped ahead to the part she was thinking of, and gestured to the screen like an empress unveiling a whole new world. Doug and Dani choked on their drinks and Roberto erupted in laughter, but sure enough, Tyro was utterly smitten. He practiced diligently for days, perfecting every fold of clothing and the way human joints worked (ineffectively, but they were burdened with meat, so he didn’t fault them for it).

When the weekend came, Dani rewarded him by giving the go-ahead for the beach trip.

 

*

 

“Are you sure this won’t blow our cover?” Amara asked under her breath, beginning to have second thoughts. She and Dani had sprawled out on their beach towels, each sporting dark sunglasses that let them feign disinterest while keeping a close eye on the others.

Dani gave her a long-suffering grimace, then jerked her head in Nate’s direction. He’d been telekinetically juggling seashells ever since they got there, wandering up and down the beach in search of the shiniest ones, and his swimming trunks were best described as distractingly ill-fitting. “If _that_ hasn’t done it yet, I don’t know what will.”

Farther down the beach, Doug and Roberto continued trying to calm an eleven foot tall giant who looked suspiciously like Hagrid, coats and furs and all.

“SELF IS NOT AFRAID,” Tyro screeched. His beard had puffed up like a porcupine’s quills, twisting itself into clumps resembling a Technarch’s familiar spines.

The ocean was a tremendous living thing, broader than even Tyro could stretch himself. It crashed and roared as a ferocious beast, grabbing greedily at the ankles of all who wandered near, and the waves swelled in an aggressive display all their own. It spewed up the inert aftermath of its meals, threatening to grind them all to dust, to sand, but the babyhumans laughed and played as if there weren’t pulverized corpses beneath their feet. How many creatures had the ocean devoured? How could the meat-things allow this to continue?

“I know you’re not, buddy.” Doug used his most soothing voice as he tried to gently tug Tyro closer to the water. They’d been blocking one of the main pathways from the parking lot to the beach for more than an hour. “You’re brave, right? The bravest! And no water’s gonna defeat you. It can’t even hurt you.”

“Yeah dude, just look at Warlock.” Roberto pointed far out to sea where a pod of dolphins could be seen frolicking in the water. It was hard to tell them apart from such a distance, but every so often the light would strike one of the dolphins and make it sparkle gold — a trick of the sun’s glare, clearly. “It’s like a gigantic swimming pool. Just jump in and swim!”

“NOT AFRAID.”

“We’re not saying you’re afraid.”

“Remember the shower? Nate showed you the shower, and you weren’t afraid of that.”

Tyro had actually wandered in while Nate was _taking_ a shower, and he’d been shameless enough to invite Tyro in so he could show off the wonders of indoor plumbing. It had resulted in many, many unwanted questions on everyone’s part.

“NEGATIVE.”

“Don’t pull that with me. I know you remember.”

“TELEVISION INFORMED SELF THERE ARE SHARKMONSTERS.”

“And they’re all much, much smaller than you.”

“NOT SHARKTOPUS.”

“Tyro, please stop yelling, you can’t— _when did he see Sharktopus?!_ ” Doug rounded on Roberto in an instant.

Holding up his hands, Roberto took a step back. “Woah! Not me! Actually not me! Read this face, this is not a lying face!”

Doug glowered at him a moment longer, expecting some crack to appear in that masterfully innocent facade, then whirled back toward Tyro. He stood on his tiptoes to try and see over the bushy beard as he sternly asked, “Who showed you Sharktopus?!”

“Meat-thing.”

“ _Tyro._ ”

“…Team-thing?”

“I want a name!” Doug would be having words with whoever broke the child-friendly media restriction.

Tyro reached into his pockets as if he expected to find the name within. He opened his mouth once, twice, then tried, “Ami-thing?”

The boys turned to stare at each other in confusion.“…Sam?” guessed one, just as the other said, “Dani?”

“Affirmative.”

“Sam _and_ Dani?”

Tyro’s beard bristled with panic. “R-uh-thing? Yan-thing?”

It took a moment for clarity to dawn, and when it did Doug covered his mouth in shock. “Oh my god. He doesn’t know your names.”

“TEAM-THINGS,” Tyro yelled defensively. They should all have been happy he thought of them as silly family and not silly meat! It wasn’t _his_ fault that all meat-things looked the same. Only Doug had a special lifeglow that distinguished him from the rest.

Roberto gaped, utterly appalled. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. Tyro. Buddy. Come on. You know me, right? Berto? The fun uncle? The one you’ve been hanging out with all week? Most handsome in the household? Playboy extraordinaire? Brazilian Tom Selleck? …You remember Tom Selleck, right? Right?”

Tyro’s brow furrowed as he stared down at Roberto. “…Hairy-thing?”

“See?” Doug’s voice was barely more than a squeak, such was the strain of containing his amusement. “He does remember.” When Roberto gave him a shove, he couldn’t even bring himself to fight back, just grinned back and waited to see if Roberto would crack.

“How can you not know about us? Didn’t Warlock ever tell you stories? He’s always telling stories! Da Costa the Great, Sunspot the Spectacular — ringing any bells?”

“Negative.”

“He must’ve said _something!_ ”

A crease appeared in the massive beard as Tyro frowned. “Assertion: Self received no Earthstories.”

“…at all?” Doug asked quietly.

Tyro threw up his hands and stomped off down the beach, his impatience with the meat-things momentarily outweighing his fear of the ocean. Why did they never understand what he told them?

“Psh. Stories couldn’t do us justice anyway.” Roberto stretched, putting on a show for a passing trio of ladies. “Bet ‘Lock was just waiting to show him the real thing.”

“…Something like that.”

Doug stared down at the massive footprints that Tyro had left in the sand. He thought he’d needed to live up to the picture in Tyro’s head, but there wasn’t a picture there at all. He’d never been part of the story. It didn’t change anything — he still wanted Tyro to have the best possible stay — but it make him feel like a stranger in his own skin, like he too was being rewarded for perfecting the meatform everyone demanded.

The sun was roasting him alive under his T-shirt, the smell of his sunscreen distracted him with its greasy script, and the endless chatter of the beachgoers grated on his nerves. He never joined the team on their beach trips; now he remembered why. And the screams, cripes, why were so many children always screaming?

“MEATLINGS COME BACK!”

…Oh.

“Self endeavors to be pleasant and outgoing! Self called you babymeat from friendlyscripts! Not carnivorousintent!” The giant lumbered along, stretching his neck and arms after the fleeing pack of traumatized children. Sand had gotten into his circuitry, and in a natural cleaning mechanism it slowly bled its way out of his face. In a final bid for friendship, Tyro reached into his gut and pulled out a handful of stale baked goods. “Self has cookies!”

“ _TYRO!_ ”

 

*

 

Once Tyro tried to stash one of the crying children in his chest for safekeeping, enough was enough. It was time for the magic words.

“The tide’s rising…” Doug turned to stare out at the ocean, a dark and brooding gleam in his eyes. His mouth twisted into a grim frown. “The sea goblins will be here soon.”

One second Tyro towered over him as a mighty warrior, and the next he cowered behind Doug like a spooked puppy, peeking out from behind Doug’s knees and launching sensors in every direction. It was all too easy to spin the story from there and convince Tyro that burying himself in the sand was the only way to stay safe — after all, weren’t all the other children covered in sand? Why would they endure it if it wasn’t a protective measure?

“There you go,” Doug said, adjusting his rental umbrella before patting down the sand around Tyro’s neck. Only his lumpy head remained above ground like a misshapen hunk of rock. Doug retreated into the shade and leaned back against Tyro. He was pretty darn good at this parenting thing. “You’ll be safe now, pal. Don’t you worry.”

Tyro scarcely made a peep, remaining on high alert and scanning all the beach inhabitants. He focused on Warlock’s familiar presence out at sea where he was still frolicking with the dolphins. A defensive perimeter against the goblins, and allies to help patrol it! Warlock would keep him safe. He always did.

With Tyro pacified for the moment, Doug watched the ocean for a few minutes then pulled out his phone. He wondered if anyone had bothered to tell Tyro about the rest of his family.

 

**[Prince Charming]** …Any interest in being a fake aunt?

 

Doug didn’t expect a response right away, but his phone gave an angry buzz only a few minutes later. He grinned at the response.

 

**[Sinclairity]** Lord, what have you done?

**[Prince Charming]** Not me! Gosh, Rahney. Warlock’s the one with the kid.

**[Sinclairity]** If he looks a bit like you I’m tossin the phone.

 

“Hey Tyro, look here!” Doug sat up and switched to camera mode, centering the picture on that supremely confused and clunky face emerging from the sands. “Say cheese.”

Tyro’s brow furrowed and part of his sand defenses began to collapse. “Cheese?” he asked as he sprouted a dozen tiny builders to fix the castle.

Doug sent the picture over without delay.

 

**[Prince Charming]** See? Handsome fellow, just like his dad.

 

When no response came for another few minutes, Doug began to worry he’d done something wrong. He scrolled through his inbox as he waited and smiled at the dozen selfies Warlock had taken with the dolphins. At last a reply arrived with a picture attached: Tier drooling on a pillow on the couch. Doug held the picture out for Tyro to see.

“Look, it’s your cousin Tier.”

“Cousinbeing?” Tyro asked quietly. He eyed the image with more interest than Doug had expected.

“Yeah. He’s your Aunt Rahney’s kid, so that makes you cousins.”

Tyro was silent for a moment, and then his face lit up. “Cheese!”

Doug scrambled to take another picture of Tyro’s smiling face, then let him dictate a message.

 

**[Prince Charming]** Tyro says: GREETINGS FUZZYCOUSIN. SELF IS TYRO.

**[Sinclairity]** I’ll pass the message on when naptime’s over, Ty. But we both send our love.

 

Now that Tyro’s interest was piqued, he made Doug go over the entire family tree. The more New Mutants and relations he learned about, the happier he was. They ended up trading messages with Leong and Nga for a good hour along with a bunch of silly snapshots, then somehow stumbled into a game of Twenty Questions with the younger Guthries. Against Doug’s better judgment, Tyro even made him track down the number of Roberto’s mom, and he joyously boomed a greeting to his _unclemother_ all the way in Brazil.

When the beach began to clear for the evening, a bright-eyed blonde came over to fetch them. It was hard to tell if Warlock was wearing a Luna Lovegood to match their resident half-giant, or if he’d taken up wearing manic pixie dream Magik around. Either way, Doug bit his tongue and helped brush the sand off of Tyro before they retreated to the boardwalk for dinner.

The rest of the team had gone on ahead to their reservation at a nice sit-down restaurant where Tyro most certainly could not join them. Doug didn’t blame them, fully aware the day had been a reward for them as much as for Tyro. He just grabbed a quick bite from a nearby stall and fell into step alongside Warlock, the pair of them following a few yards behind Tyro so they could keep an eye on him while he explored.

“So. I’ve gotta ask.” Doug spoke between mouthfuls, hoping Tyro wouldn’t piece together the conversation that way. “What the heck are the goblins?”

Warlock blanched and lifted a hand to rub at the back of his neck. “Oh, err. Kvch very… Many areas dangerous for wandering crecheling.” He looked ahead to towering Mt. Tyro with a nostalgic glint in his eye, remembering when Tyro fit in his cupped hands. “Self may have told him…Limbodimension exists in planetcenter.”

“…And if he wanders off, the goblins will get him.”

“Affirmative.”

Doug clapped a hand on his shoulder. “That’s some slick parenting, partner.”

“Lie no bigger than falsehood of Santabeing,” Warlock answered dourly. He’d never gotten over _that_ disillusionment.

Suddenly, Tyro rushed back and grabbed both of their hands, pulling his dads over to a magical discovery: a photo booth. “Observe! BIGGER photodevice! Now Tyroself can take BIGGER images to send familybeings!!”

Doug and Warlock glanced at each other, but neither had the heart to tell him the pictures wouldn’t actually be any bigger. Doug simply reached for his wallet to pull out a few bucks for the machine. He could feel Tyro’s eyes fall upon the wallet and the few team pictures he had tucked into the photo pages inside.

Before Tyro could ask about the wallet, Warlock started stuffing him into the photo booth. With a lot of shifting and squirming — no one could see them inside the booth, thankfully — both Technarchs managed to shuck their humanforms and squeeze their way inside. Then a long arm snaked out and pulled Doug inside too, settling him firmly in the middle.

While Warlock tried to explain the rules to Tyro, beeping and chirping with incredible speed, Doug scrolled through the frame options and chose an appropriately cutesy one.

“Ready?” Doug asked before he hit the button, and a chorus of affirmatives greeted him.

Whatever face Warlock made, Tyro tried to mirror it. They curled their hair into funny hats, stretched their grins out like taffy, and in one tremendously disturbing photo budded hundreds of tiny selfsprouts. Through it all, and through a good twenty bucks since they kept wanting more, Doug sat calm amidst the chaos and tried his best to smile. He couldn’t begin to keep up, but heck if they weren’t entertaining to watch.

“Doug! You must smile!” Tyro commanded between photos, nudging him painfully in the back.

“I _am_ smiling.” Doug grit his teeth and kept that polished grin turned towards the camera.

Maybe it was exuberance, or desire for family togetherness, or a complete misunderstanding of the elasticity of human faces, but as Tyro grabbed Doug’s cheeks and yanked them up into a much grander smile, Doug wasn’t worried about reading reasons. All he could do was shriek and hope his face stayed in one piece.

Warlock rounded on Tyro the moment the picture had been snapped, howling at him in shrill screeches that barely carried any meaning besides rage. _No one hurt Doug. Ever._ Tyro cowered behind Doug, trembling so badly he almost discorporated, and babbled a host of apologies. It wasn’t the instinctive fear of a siredam, but it was far more severe than his terror of the sea goblins.

“Warlock!” Doug shouted, reaching out for his wrist. He gave him a firm look then mouthed _selfsoulfriend_ with aching cheeks. Warlock stared at him with wide eyes, and then that swell of panic crested and washed over them both. His hard lines softened as he eased back into a frustrated frown, and Doug kept that grounding touch on his wrist the whole time.

“…Sorry.” Warlock didn’t look at him.

Doug wasn’t sure if he meant for yelling or for Doug’s bruised cheeks, but he nodded his acceptance. “I’m fine. I’ll be fine.” Nervous laughter filled his mouth and he grinned despite the ache. “And I bet that’ll be one heck of a photo. Right, Tyro? Bet I smiled as big as you guys.”

The Technarchs were mopey and sullen for the rest of the day, but sure enough, the photo strip was absolutely perfect. Doug tucked it into his wallet, tucked himself between the alien duo, and wondered what his face would look like with gaudy purples and blues blooming on his cheeks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Doug’s [Prince Charming] handle is matched by Rictor’s [Sir Shakesalot] in Rahney’s phone. I’ve borrowed them from a fic I’ve not yet finished. THEY ALL TOTALLY TEXT. I live in a happy universe where Rahney gets to be close friends with all her boys oKAY. (And Tier is alive, tra-la-la~)


	4. Back Porch Ponderings

At first it was only static, a distant rumble not much different from a ringing in his ears or one of Amara’s precision quakes. The frequency was barely within audible range, and from up in his bedroom Doug only picked up brief, scattered pieces. It took half an hour before the sounds linked and forced their way to the front of his mind, edging out the Malbolge riddle he’d been working on for Kitty.

_— grounded—illogical Self cannot—harrumph—_

Fingers stalling on the keyboard, Doug instinctively raised his head and tried to sift through the data and isolate the voice. It wasn’t English, but it wasn’t that choppy, restless rhythm he’d come to recognize as the native Technarch language either. With so many languages crammed into his head, sometimes it was difficult for Doug to name which was which, even if he understood the words. This one was decidedly familiar, yet not terrestrial…Kree, maybe?

_— Inside voice. Outside voice. SELF ONLY HAS ONE VOICE.—_

Doug chuckled under his breath and went to peer out his window. Sure enough, there was Tyro sitting on the back stoop, head in his hands with a second pair of arms crossed over his chest to signal his displeasure. Body language was the only thing meat-things understood, so he had combined the signs for extra emphasis.

After shutting down his computer, Doug snuck downstairs and poked his head out the back door. From up close he could see the dreadful pout carved on Tyro’s face, and his grumpy grumbles resonated even more forcefully. Tyro had no trouble with the language, or at least the same amount of trouble he had with English, copying Warlock’s personal variations and clumsily creating his own.

{ _Why do you speak Kree?_ } Doug asked curiously. His own accent was much different, high and lively as a cricket, skipping along through the syllables that Tyro had intoned with such gravity.

Tyro swung his head to face him and frowned. His only answer sounded childish and he knew it — he was too angry at Warlock and the meat-things to want to share their languages. “Because,” he answered petulantly instead, staring down at his feet.

{ _No, I meant—_ } Doug sighed and sat down next to him. “I meant where did you learn? You’re free to use any language you like with me.”

Pride kept Tyro from answering for a long moment. “…Kreebeings did not treat Self like crecheling.” All of the week’s yelling and discipline had finally weighed too much on his shoulders. “Kreebeings treated Self like _herobeing._ ”

He still hadn’t answered the question, but Doug got the gist of what was going on. Tyro’s stay with them had been one disaster after another, and he’d begun to chafe within the social boundaries they’d trapped him in. He just wasn’t made for Earth the way Warlock was.

“Hey, you’re plenty heroic to me. Tyro the Intergalactic Hero! Has a nice ring to it.”

Though the high praise usually would have done the trick, this time it only made Tyro fall quiet once more. “…Warlock was herobeing,” he corrected glumly. “Warlock says Self does not comprehend heroism because Self did not appreciate space journey program. Tyroself = Grounded.”

Doug had to bite the inside of his cheek, barely managing to keep up a sympathetic facade. “Well, I’m sure it all seems boring if you’ve already trekked the stars yourself.”

Tyro heaved a massive sigh that sounded far too much like a broken vacuum cleaner. “Meat-things have too many rules. Self cannot remember all.” He flapped his jaw a bit longer, intending to continue his rant, but suddenly lost his nerve and wilted. If he admitted to any more failures, then Doug would be just as disappointed in him as Warlock was.

That crushing guilt under Tyro’s frustration was clear to see, and Doug knew all too well what it was like to disappoint a parent. “…I forget them sometimes, too.” He poked at his still-bruised cheeks, gently lifting the corners of his mouth into a feeble smile. “I never remember to make the right expressions, and then people misunderstand me. It’s…frustrating.”

Tyro glanced at him in concern and eyed those yellow bruises. “Query: Facial construct broken?”

“Nope. We just…have a lot of rules.”

Sympathy didn’t come naturally to Tyro, and meat-things felt in such different patterns than Warlock did, so it took a while for the sentiment to sink in. When he finally understood that Doug had trouble too, that meat-things—humans—all bumbled and fumbled just as much as him, an expression of sheer relief lit up his face. His circuits crinkled as their lights skipped happily along those meandering paths.

In the evening shadows, that gentle light show soon brought a gathering of tiny moths. They settled onto Tyro’s surface and wandered about, chasing after his racing sparks. Tyro went perfectly still, rigid and motionless as an abstract sculpture, though now and then would come the slightest twitch as he nuzzled back at a particularly fuzzy little friend. He couldn’t hold himself in check long enough to make it up the stairs without property damage, but when it came to the smallest of lives, an incredible gentleness fell over him.

Doug smiled without even realizing it. “Cute, aren’t they?”

“Negative. Tinywings very foolish. Fly straight into danger.” Tyro’s mouth didn’t move as he spoke this time, for he was unwilling to disturb the moths when he could simply broadcast his speech without the useless mouth-flapping. “Correction: Foolish and courageous.”

“I always caught fireflies as a kid.” It was strangely easy to reminisce when Tyro accepted every word as precious knowledge. “They’re like the name says — little flying lights. Sounds like something you’d have on Kvch, actually.”

Tyro’s eyebrows twitched in disbelief. “Negative,” he repeated, lights slowing to a crawl, “Nothing on Kvch.”

“…Hm?”

“No tinywings. No meat-things. No lifeglow.”

“Just Technarchs,” Doug said with a grin. He knew they were a vicious lot, but it was all too easy to pretend they were all like Tyro.

“Negative. Nothing.” Tyro shivered, sending half the moths into flight. “Warlockself and Tyroself here. Conclusion: **Nothing** on Kvch.”

And suddenly it all made sense. Warlock’s tremendous reluctance to speak of so isolated a time, his unparalleled devotion to Tyro coupled with utter fear at Tyro’s impact on his environment, his worry not that of a parent whose child was their world, but a parent whose child was _all they had_. The hazardous swing of Tyro’s moral compass, accustomed to a world with few questions and a single guiding light. The language they shared, screeches and birdsong meant to express meaning to only one other person in the universe — a language Doug now wondered if Warlock had invented in the first place, planting it alongside so many hopes within his only son.

“Guess there weren’t many rules then.” Doug’s voice sounded shaky to his own ears, but it was better than the alternative — telling Tyro to _stay_. He’d never manage on Earth and they both knew it.

“Few rules. Only important ones. Lesson One: Do not take lifeglow.” Tyro’s voice shifted abruptly into a perfect mimicry of Warlock, so skillful it could have been an audio clip. “Never ever ever ever ever. Technarchs will not take lifeglow again!”

Doug flinched, opting not to tell Tyro that the vow had been broken on his account. He’d never forgiven himself, even if Warlock had, but he’d never felt quite so rotten about it as he did now that he knew how committed Tyro was to the cause. “…Sounds about right.”

“Lesson Two: Think before Self acts.” A pause. “Self bad at this one.”

_So’s the whole dang team_ , Doug thought.

“Lesson Three: Do not take lifeglow.”

“He’s awful firm on that one.”

“Affirmative. Lessons Four through Ten repeat this command. Self required reinforcement.” He shivered again, so gently that the moths didn’t even notice. It was tremendously difficult for him to remain so still. “Now Self knows better.”

Ever since discovering Warlock was a father, Doug’s curiosity had run unchecked. He wanted to know everything about Tyro, about Kvch, about their mysterious language and their cultural norms, about what a strange and inventive parent Warlock must have been, to come from such a warm and naive child. About their inside jokes, too, and every single secret.

But instead of grilling Tyro for information, Doug only said, “Turn off your lights.”

Some flickered out immediately. Others dimmed minute by minute until they were a mere memory of light, fuzzy around the edges of Doug’s vision. And as the lights went, so did the moths, heading out in search of new suns and stars to dazzle them. Tyro’s form was distinguishable even in the dark, his surface blacker than the night, as if he were a constellation of light and its absence and nothing more.

“Gratitude,” Tyro rumbled, then lifted a hand to wave. “Farewell tinywings.”

They sat in silence for a while, Doug listening to the sounds of the city and Tyro listening to who knew what — the music of the spheres, perhaps, or the last gasp of some distant comet. Or the heartbeats of all the creatures for miles around.

“…Warlock taught Self other things. Unnumbered lessons.” Tyro’s voice still held a peaceful lull to it, but his boastfulness had returned in full force, fed by Doug’s interest.

“Oh?”

“Cleverness. Courage. Self-sacrifice. Herobeing lessons! And Self defeated siredam with them!” He turned Doug’s way and grinned broadly, waiting for the certain show of pride that awaited him.

But Doug didn’t say a word. He stared back at Tyro with wide eyes, trying to tell himself he’d misunderstood — those lessons could mean anything, really. Plenty of people were clever, and all heroes were courageous, and…and Warlock was the one who was better at _self_ -sacrifice, so surely they were Warlock’s values, not…

“…Doug is not proud of Self for learning these lessons?” Tyro asked glumly.

“I, um.” He rubbed a hand over his mouth and took a shaky breath. Even now, the others sometimes looked at Doug like he was a tragedy, first in a long line of miseries that would haunt them for years, and he was so very used to letting them all down. Warlock carried that hurt more than anyone else, so Doug understood why he’d buried it, why he hadn’t told Tyro about their old partnership. But to find out that Warlock had spun the story a different way, remembered him like this, too—like a hero—stole all the breath from his lungs.

“I’m really, _really_ proud,” Doug said at last, laying a hand on Tyro’s arm and earning a tiny glow around its outline. “Those were the lessons your…d-dad knew best.”

“Because Warlock is herobeing!”

Doug gave a small nod, his voice barely a whisper as he answered, “Yeah. He sure is.”

 

*

 

A little past midnight, Warlock slipped into Doug’s room and curled up behind his chair, perching his head on Doug’s shoulder so he could watch the Malbolge riddle take shape on the computer screen. Now and then he chirped an idea to make it even trickier, or a secondary riddle Doug could bury within the first with a little clever wordplay, but mostly he remained silent. His head weighed little more than a feather, unable to be a burden even when he was tired and sad.

Doug reached back with one hand to scratch affectionately at Warlock’s crest, his other hand still typing away, eyes still focused on the screen.

“…Tyro will leave soon,” Warlock mumbled, expecting the news to elicit a sigh of relief.

It didn’t. Warlock shifted slightly to watch Doug’s face, trying to gauge his reaction to it all, but Doug never turned to watch and read him in turn. In an even voice he asked, “Why didn’t you ever tell me about him?”

Warlock froze up, and the only thing that kept him in place was those fingers still combing through the spines of his crest. It wasn’t a challenge or a demand. There wasn’t any anger in it. But even so, Warlock couldn’t answer, couldn’t admit how terrified he was of the rest of the team thinking him an unfit parent, or even worse, being _ashamed._ At last he gave a tiny jerk of his shoulders in an awkward shrug.

More quietly this time, Doug asked, “Why didn’t you ever tell him about _me?_ ”

Because they buried him in the earth, and then day by day the Earth became him, and Warlock couldn’t live in a mausoleum of memories anymore, couldn’t _live._ It put him to flight, sent him fleeing in reverse along the same old path, fleeing the only thing more terrifying than the Magus. How could he share that with Tyro — sorrow, hurt, and loss? Was he supposed to make Tyro miss someone he’d never even known, or worse yet, watch as Tyro didn’t care at all?

His head sagged heavily against Doug’s shoulder, and a moment later Doug stopped typing.

“…Thank you.”

Warlock gave a confused chirp. “Query: Reason?”

Doug shook his head, then slowly let it rest against Warlock’s. “Just…thanks. For everything.”

And though Warlock gave no answer, this time he glowed warm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Malbolge](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malbolge) \- A computer science major friend of mine pointed out this language to me, and _holy heck_ if it isn't perfect for Doug being a giant showoff.


	5. Leaving the Nest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Illustrated by the illustrious [stem-cell](http://stem-cell.tumblr.com)~

The night before Tyro’s departure, Doug and Warlock joined him in the backyard and pitched the biggest tent they could find. Tyro’s torso barely fit within, and despite an intense show of concentration and care, he’d torn a hole in the top before even half an hour had passed. Warlock chirped in laughter and gestured to the night sky above.

“The view’s better this way,” Doug hummed, lying back with his head on Warlock’s knee. They never went stargazing anymore, let alone camping. They hardly even went out to grab groceries just the two of them, too afraid of jinxing it after the disastrous deportation incident at the Golden Gate Park. Their alone time was measured in closed quarters, hovering at the ready for whatever mission call might arrive. Mapping imaginary star systems made for a wonderful change.

Tyro turned his sensors upward and tried to figure out what exactly they wanted a view of. The nearest high-density lifeglow source was that planet’s sun, but at their current rotation it wouldn’t return to their sky for another few hours. As far as he knew, meat-thing visual sensors weren’t powerful enough to see farther than that. Was it a cultural habit? A metaphorical view? Warlock had attempted to explain metaphors, and Doug tried with kennings, and it had all ended in a heated argument over _meat-things_ that Tyro couldn’t make any sense of at all. Were they staring off in the direction of his upcoming journey? …With worry? Regret? Anticipation?

“…It is humanthing,” Warlock told him gently. They’d been watching the gears slowly turn in Tyro’s head for quite a while before figuring out what the problem was. “To dream of spacedark and gaze at distant stars.”

“Adventure, exploration, and all that jazz.” Doug spread out his arms and pressed his palms against the sky. “The great unknown…for us, at least. I see constellations and you see a few dozen highways to the next galaxy over.”

Though he nodded his understanding, Tyro kept staring at them. “Humanthing,” he repeated to himself. “Query: Warlock enjoys this?”

A flicker of light passed over Warlock’s cheeks, embarrassment over being snared in a trap no one had thought to set. “Self has…affirmative, Self developed appreciation.” He’d seen plenty of stars long, long ago during his frantic flight from Kvch, but it was only when he’d found a home on Earth that he learned to watch them with such wonder. They reminded him how immense the universe was, and how lucky he’d been to find his own little place in it all. But they were sad, too. Distant and cold and filled with loss, the way they’d been when he left Earth and all that warmth behind…

“Is that one Kvch?” Doug asked out of the blue, pointing to a random star.

Tyro looked up again. “Negative.”

“What about that one?”

“Negative.”

“Hmmm. That one?”

“Kvch is **not** visible.”

Warlock pressed his face down against Doug’s hair in silent gratitude for the change in conversation topic, wanting nothing to do with stars as long as he had a selfsoulfriend to ground him.

“If I point in the right direction, do I win a free trip?”

“….Request for confirmation: Doug wishes to visit Kvch?” Tyro’s expression shifted into a strange mix of emotion, part furrowed brows, part hesitant grin, and all confusion.

“I’d love to,” Doug offered with a grin, just as Warlock gave him a warning pinch. No way was he letting a human anywhere near that planet, even a human as clever and complicated as Doug.

To put an end to the discussion, Warlock knit his fingers together into a little makeshift model of his homeworld’s main creche terminal, every towering peak and abstract citadel recreated in perfect detail. Though marked by the same faint lines of circuitry, the city did not share any of his flickering lights, only a lifeless metallic sheen. “Now you have viewed all viewables. Tourism unnecessary.”

Doug reached out and cupped the little city in his hands. He investigated it from every angle, memorizing the skyline and the way the shadowy shapes blended into one another. “This is where you were born—err, decanted?”

The miniature folded itself inside out like a paper fortune teller, blossoming into a three-tiered orchid with jagged petals. “Self from royal creche,” Warlock hummed, “Buried far within terminal.” The petals crashed into each other as waves and brought on a third image, a vast field of honeycomb that dripped with lifeglow. Warlock paused for a moment to decide on his translation. “Worker creches not as…hardy. Tyro decanted here.”

“Query—”

They both turned to Tyro, smiling softly and inviting whatever childhood recollection he wanted to share.

Yet Tyro wasn’t staring at the model of his homeworld. His focus had centered on Doug and Warlock together, on the way Doug’s hands cupped around Warlock’s and the way they so comfortably leaned together. “Why do you give Warlock warmth?”

Doug dropped his hands. “What?”

“Meat-things require heat. Self does not. Technarchs do not.” He bristled at the thought of requiring such a thing — temperatures never crossed his mind before this trip to Earth. “But Warlock becomes warm when you are near. It is not lifeglow. Why does he take it?”

“…Affectionglow?” Doug offered feebly, not sure how to answer. “Most humans like touch, and we’re warm, so he just…harmonizes…or something…”

Neither Technarch paid any attention to Doug’s explanation, too busy staring at each other and buzzing a strange displeasure at a frequency too low for human hearing. Tyro’s question hadn’t been a request for information or clarification of a confusing matter. It was _judgment_. All week long Warlock had been toeing the line between Technarch and human, terrified of being too much of either, and now Tyro had caught him in the act.

“Warlock different around meat-things,” Tyro continued, watching as Warlock tucked himself further behind Doug. “Correction: Warlock different around _humanbeings_. Self could not decipher emotion until now. You are happy. More than Self has ever observed.”

Warlock didn’t move. Even when Doug turned to give him a tiny encouraging smile, he didn’t budge an inch. All of him was focused on the frustrationworryjoy that Tyro broadcast back at him across their link. They hadn’t communicated that way since Tyro was an infant, too young even to shift his vocal apparatus, and it was jarring and desperately nostalgic all at once. Never had Tyro broadcast such an important message.

“Conclusion: Warlock enjoys Humanthings more than Technarchthings. But you told Self _nothing!_ ”

“Tyro…”

“Request for explanation!” he barked, though it wasn’t anger making him raise his voice. He’d always believed Technarchs were the best the universe had to offer, he’d idolized Warlock and wanted to be the best son he could, but the whole time Warlock had been hiding this other world from him. It wasn’t even a betrayal; it was simply incomprehensible.

Warlock shifted slowly, drawing all of his threads back into his core and letting them settle in new shapes, lines more human than Technarch, edges more Technarch than human, all of him in flux. The more Doug watched, the more of himself he could see reflected, but every mirror image had Warlock’s heart shining through.

“Self is…faulty Technarch. Sometimes barely Technarch at all.” A collection of human metaphors made manifest, thinking so firmly in terms of racing pulse and roiling stomach, tongue-tied goosebumps and golden hearts and stiff upper lips that he shifted his body to match, living by unnatural rules to fit a too-familiar mold.

Heartbreak dawned on Tyro’s face, and Warlock had to turn his head away before he could continue, hands clenching at his sides. “But Tyro must be proper Technarch. _Better_ Technarch. Tyro must be our future. That is why Self taught you only Technarch ways.”

“…You are not faulty Technarch,” Tyro growled at last. “You are best Technarch.”

Warlock shook his head, his siredam’s rejection echoing in his ears. “You do not know.”

“If Tyroself is future then Tyroself decides! Warlock is best Technarch.”

“You have not _met_ other Technarchs,” he argued in a hollow voice. They all knew what he thought of other Technarchs and all their monstrous deeds. “You are young. Self has kept you from many things. Someday you will understand but—”

“ **Self will only be Technarch like you.** ”

Tyro’s words clattered out with an incredible force that left his form rippling, an intense shudder passing through his circuits. “Self likes Humanthings! Cookies and meatlings and—and instruments! We do not have those. We do not have TVland or tentstructures or tinywings or…fatherbeings.” He crumpled at the last moment, everything hinging on his final question. “Query: Must Self choose?”

Warlock closed his eyes and bit his lip, then flinched when he caught himself in that human movement. He’d spent so long pretending it didn’t hurt when Tyro demeaned Earth and its meat-things that now he didn’t know to react to this—acceptance? Had he let foreign influences corrupt their only chance for a new Technarchy? If Tyro found happiness here, would he find the same ruin as well? It would be tremendously hypocritical to tell Tyro to choose — do as Self says, not as Self does — but it would be the simplest answer for them all.

And then Doug put a warm hand on his shoulder, and Warlock knew affectionglow was too precious a treasure to keep to himself.

“No,” he croaked slowly, raising his head to gaze at his son. “Tyro must only be Tyro, and Self will be proud.”

 

*

 

In the morning, the whole gang gathered to see Tyro off. Dani and Amara gave him polite hugs, Nate slapped him on the back so hard he almost broke his hand, and Roberto slipped him a thumb drive full of _Earth culture_.

Anguished over watching his son leave the nest yet again, Warlock wrapped himself around Tyro in the fiercest of embraces and shifted until he’d bundled almost all of Tyro in his arms. Tyro was too big to be carried on his shoulders, sat in his lap, or enfolded in the careful cradle of Warlock’s chest, but he would never be too big for hugs. “Command: Keep in touch this time,” he murmured sternly, thankful for the first time that Technarchs couldn’t cry.

“Self promises.” Tyro pulled away slowly and tried to avoid the undertow of Warlock’s emotions. Now he understood why Warlock had left without a goodbye last time — they _hurt._

Doug stepped forward last of all with his hands held behind his back. “Sorry these aren’t wrapped, but I missed your last birthday and I’ll probably miss the next one too, so…here.”

The first present he handed to Tyro was a large green book with a lion, a scarecrow, and a tin man on the cover. Tyro gave it a dubious look, preparing himself to be disappointed by the broken Earth books once again, but when he opened it up the pictures sprung to life. It was just like the books Warlock had read him when he was small, books where the characters danced and the scenery popped up into a proper background. An emerald city sat there waiting for him to read and explore, and the glimmer of delight in Tyro’s eyes knew no equal.

“It was one of my favorites when I was a kid,” Doug explained sheepishly. He knew the book wouldn’t compare — the magical ones Tyro remembered had been made from Warlock’s shifting fingers all along, a literal sleight of hand — but the way Tyro smiled made it worth the inevitable letdown. “And…Warlock made a recording of me reading it. So you can take that too, if you want.”

“Self will treasure.” Tyro slotted the book into his chest where it quickly disappeared from sight, lost to the beginnings of his very own library.

The second gift was much smaller, but much more important: a wallet stuffed to bursting with family photos. Doug solemnly explained that it was a coming of age present, something all adults carried with them always. He’d filled it with as many pictures as he could of Warlock and the team, and Leong and Nga and all the Guthries and a certain fuzzy cousin as well. Tyro turned it over and over in his hands, gazing in awe, but Doug stopped him before he could open it.

“Bad luck to open it now,” he lied, too embarrassed to have the others know how much work he’d put into it. “Better wait until you’re out in space.”

Tyro nodded. “With adventurexploration and alljazz.”

“Exactly.” After a moment’s hesitation, Doug stepped in and gave Tyro a quick hug too. “Take care, buddy. I mean it. Keep asking lots of questions and try not to terrify any meatlings.”

“Affirmative,” Tyro answered, but he’d buried his head down against Doug’s shoulder and refused to let go. “Self promises all. Do fatherbeings promise too?”

Doug smiled, feeling Warlock’s gaze settle on him. “Affirmative. We promise too.”

 

*

 

As promised, Tyro didn’t investigate his presents until he was halfway to the moon. He wanted to scope out the other planets in Earth’s system before heading back to Hala to check on the reconstruction. With Earth shining blue at his back, Tyro pulled out the tiny wallet and fumbled to undo the clasp. Most of the photos were held neatly in place by their plastic covers, but the first one was much too long and went slipping through Tyro’s hands. He scrambled after it, caught it, and barked a happy laugh. Humanthings and affectionglow…yes, now he understood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [This](http://www.amazon.com/Wonderful-Wizard-Oz-Commemorative-Pop-up/dp/0689817517) is the book Doug got for Tyro.
> 
> Bigger and more detailed version of the photostrip available [here](http://stem-cell.tumblr.com/post/97487505940)!


End file.
